Yes, if you run a business with owned tools/product, then you will likely own a (business) vehicle.

I wonder about kids, though. If we moved to a model where sports equipment was rented (like transportation), it wouldn’t have to be lugged around. In terms of car seats, they’re about safety and mostly at higher rates of speed. If AVs are going slowly in urban areas (25 mph and less, which may be what cities will push for), and AVs are super safe, why have car seats—especially if AVs have seats facing the center, with room for a stroller in the center.

Will kids and pretty much anyone who currently isn't allowed to operate a vehicle be able to use an AV on their own? This assumes the vehicle is fully autonomous and the rider doesn't need to take control at all.

Will kids and pretty much anyone who currently isn't allowed to operate a vehicle be able to use an AV on their own? This assumes the vehicle is fully autonomous and the rider doesn't need to take control at all.

sure - parents use Uber to ferry their older kids a lot already - I'm sure kids of a certain age will be allowed to use them - may have to be city or state laws to protect AV providers - or they would just likely ban kids of any age to cover their butts. I'm sure they will have cameras on the interior of all these cars for safety reasons, to deal with people who damage them, puke in them, litter etc. - so I'm sure parents will have ability to monitor their kids in these pods.

I still hope medium dense cities will have their act together enough to incentivize small shuttles as tweener option between traditional transit like heavily-used high volume bus routes, BRT and LRT - and single-occupant vehicles. If door-to-door ride share, single occupant cars/pods are as cheap some folks think they will be, in say 10-15 years, then congestion is huge issue. If there are small AV shuttles that say can avoid a congestion tax, or get priority on the road, that can carry 8-12 people, then they could even consider have special shuttles dedicated to just kids at say, school times/routes. Kids may still need adults in their multi-occupant shuttles, buses but at least adult doesn't have to worry about driving and will have less worries about kids getting run over by when they get out, so they can concentrate on supervising the kids.

Once again, all this intergrated tech is going to bring huge privacy and data protection issues as these private companies will have your every movement recorded.

karen nelson wrote:Once again, all this intergrated tech is going to bring huge privacy and data protection issues as these private companies will have your every movement recorded.

It would not surprise me one bit if some of these vehicles dispense with windows, ostensibly in the name of safety or cost or whatever, and replace them initially with a camera-based view of the outside… that, over time, would helpfully display the most relevant ads to you on your journey.

Or, in their ride hailing app: “Watch this 2-minute video [ad] and get a free ride!”

Or what about a virtual/holographic/AR “conductor” who tells jokes, shares memes, or gives information (tourism), and whom you can tip for good service.

Elon Musk has racked up enough bona fide provable successes to disqualify him from being a charlatan. Jia Yueting *is* a charlatan. Faraday Future is 100% pure vapor and has delivered nothing. They aren't even doing Formula E anymore.

Elon Musk is a tragic visionary who chronically overpromises and under delivers. Tesla is probably doomed, but I admire anyone gutsy enough to even try what he's attempting to do.

I don't have a problem with Elon when he stays in his lane. Even if Tesla goes underwater in two years, they've still accelerated the broader transition away from fossil fuels, and that's an unqualified good thing. But building a car, or a car company, doesn't make you qualified to talk about infrastructure or interurban transit or urban planning or vacuum tube trains, and he has a tendency to have very strong, very wrong, opinions on those subjects. Elon Twitter is the GM Futurama expo of our generation.